


late nights & love stories

by Anonymous



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Coffee Shops & Cafés, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, F/M, First Meetings, Fluff, Fluff and Humor, Meet-Cute, Sleep Deprivation, Soft Ben Solo, it happens to the best of us, it is just as fluffy as it sounds, protect ben at all costs, rey is a little crazy, this is just a coffee shop au meet-cute
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-02
Updated: 2020-06-02
Packaged: 2021-03-03 18:53:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,006
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24500368
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: In which Ben is severely sleep-deprived and keeps frequenting Rey's cafe. She's a little bit concerned for his wellbeing but doesn't really mind the view.A meet-cute.
Relationships: Kylo Ren/Rey, Rey/Ben Solo, Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
Comments: 19
Kudos: 254
Collections: Anonymous





	late nights & love stories

Technically the shop is open every single hour of every day of the year except for Christmas and New Year’s.

But she uses the word _technically_ because nobody ever really comes to get coffee after two in the morning. Kanata Koffee is in the city but it’s located near a bunch of neighborhoods and is far enough away from the financial and tech districts and the airport that nobody really feels the need to stop by in the late hours of the night. Which Rey totally, absolutely loves, as she gets paid to do her homework at the counter. The only other person who’s ever working is Kaydel, who’s usually just taking naps and doing inventory in the back (she thinks, she’s seen the girl like twice; she values her privacy to an extreme). It’s great. Ideal, some might say, even though the college campus is a little far from her. She can deal with the extra commute. It doesn’t cost extra by bus and it’s totally worth it.

Yeah, occasionally someone comes in and grabs a late-night fix if they have to head in early or if they’re passing by, but it rarely occurs. So when he first comes in and stays, she’s a little shocked. Wait. Scratch that. She’s mostly just confused.

The Man, as she likes to call him in her head, looks like a basic corporate asshole. Well, not basic. He looks loaded. She’s pretty sure he’s driving a sports car that’s so fancy she can’t even pronounce the brand, and his suits look like they cost more than the shop, and he wears an assortment of Rolexes. _Really_. He has several. He wears a different one every day. And he’s tall and broad and angry, which definitely fits the stereotype. He looks like every guy she knows who’s majoring in Finance, but like . . . new and improved and pissed. At least for the first week. The pissing calms down after a while.

Normally she asks people for their names when they order so she can write their name on the cup, but she never asks him for his because he’s literally the only person there and it would be a waste of time. In retrospect, she really should have, because now she wastes even _more_ time staring at him and wondering what his name is. Because. He’s like. _Always there._

Fact: for the past two and a half weeks, the Man has been spending at least four hours sitting alone (well, with her) and staring at his computer screen at Kanata’s Koffee between the hours of twelve to six in the morning four days out of the week.

Fact: every time he comes in he looks more and more exhausted (this is a _scientific_ observation, his eyelids are drooping and his powerful stride turns more and more sluggish. Really. Rey’s sat through enough high school science to understand qualitative observations).

Fact: he orders a blueberry muffin and extra-large macchiato once when he comes in and then doesn’t say anything else for the next few hours.

Opinion: he’s hot as hell and probably needs deep emotional support.

She doesn’t know anything about him at all but he comes in during prime sleepytime whenever he works and he just doesn’t look like he’s doing well. And she sees clones of him all the time. It’s the stupid techbro culture. It’s sad, really, how so many people literally live at work. Except for the people who work at, like, Google and Facebook. She wouldn’t really mind that.

(She thinks idly about the recruiting event next weekend that she needs to rewrite her resume for.)

Anyways, it’s Wednesday morning and she’s just finished her last physics problem. The assignment isn’t due for another three days but she absolutely hates procrastinating and she loves the feeling she gets when all her work is just _done._ Pure relaxation. Finn thinks that makes her rather masochistic but she doesn’t really care. Having fun hits different when there aren’t any essays looming over her head. She thinks that he’d understand if he did it too. 

She puts it away and just starts abstractly staring at the Man. She can’t really see his computer from this angle, but it looks like a classy model. Windows. Not a Mac (which are for _plebs,_ Rose had complained to her multiple times, a true Samsung fan). She knows enough to see that he’s constantly switching between spreadsheets and an email messenger and Slack. His furious typing makes her feel like he might have a similar work ethic — she’s never seen him _not_ be productive, to the point where it’s really concerning. He hasn’t even taken a bathroom break on her watch. They talk about this in like, every seminar ever. Burnout is a thing. It’s a pretty bad thing, actually. The other side of being lazy isn’t exactly kittens and rainbows.

Anyways.

Rey doesn’t really know what it is. She’s not _that_ sleep-deprived. She is a little bit, but she’s a college student. She’s gotten six hours cumulatively over the past twenty-four hours and that’s definitely enough to be functional. Maybe it’s the high of finishing her physics homework in record time and the fact that it’s Wednesday (Wednesday is her favorite day because it’s right in the middle of everything else, without the stress of Monday or fatigue of Friday). Maybe it’s the fact that she just ended her period and her god awful cramps are nowhere to be found. Also, she just ate a cookie and she’s on a slight sugar high. It’s four in the morning. This isn’t really a real time. She feels detached. That’s probably it.

That’s the reason why she pipes up and says, “Hey, are you alright?” when the Man puts his awfully sad and handsome face into his hands. She thinks that he’s reading an email, from the blurry white box she sees on his screen. She's grown awfully familiar with his mannerisms. It's a little concerning, truthfully.

And she really shouldn't have said that. There’s a pretty clear line she thinks that they’ve both delineated over the past ten days he’s sat here and _talking-like-humans_ is definitely on the other side of it. She still doesn’t even know this guy’s name. For a second she literally wishes she could bite her tongue and she opens her mouth to say . . . well, anything (what do you say to make up for a situation like this?) and then — 

He groans aloud and moves his head out. He’s a little too far away to make _eye-contact_ eye-contact, but he does something of the sort. “Truly? I don’t know.”

Ugh. That voice. She’s only heard it shape varieties of one sentence before (“Extra-large caramel macchiato and a blueberry muffin, please.”) and it’s really beautiful. She’s never really used the word beautiful to describe something non-material but that’s what it _is._ It’s strong and warm and powerful and also, in the artificial light, strangely pitiful. It’s an absolute conundrum.

She’s seated in a comfortable wicker chair behind the counter (which she gets out of whenever she sees a customer, and yeah she’s not supposed to use it, but she can’t really be expected to stand for four hours and Kaydel’s seen it whenever she does come around for like five seconds so it can’t really be that big of a deal. Plus, the mahogany-stained counter is really high and it’s hard to see it anyways. It just kind of looks like she’s squatting. Now she needs to change her chain of thoughts. Urgently), but she gets up so that she doesn’t have to project her voice farther to answer him. “Work, huh?”

“Yes. The deadlines for the projects I’m managing are just — utterly, _totally_ ridiculous, and they’re global, so my entire schedule has gone out the window.”

She frowns. “That’s crazy. Are you in investment banking or something?”

“Oh, no. Just a CFO.”

He says it so carelessly and she feels like laughing. “ _Just_ a CFO?”

One corner of his mouth turns up. “I suppose.”

She doesn’t want to let the conversation die out so she makes _another_ hasty decision. “You seem tired, though. It can’t be easy to be on top of projects in different timezones.”

That manages to break him out into a halfhearted chuckle, but more in a _yeah-this-is-ridiculous_ way than a _you’re-funny_ way. “I’ve heard that being tired does things for my personality, actually. I’m not the best to hang around with when I sleep. Temper issues,” his eyebrow quirks, “I also think I become much more forthright when I’m tired. I don’t know why I’m telling you this.”

“Fatigue is comparable to being slightly drunk,” she quips on the balls of her feet. “You probably just need to sleep. Also, I have a shining personality. You’re probably just drawn to me. I’m irresistible.”

Oh, god. Is she trying to flirt? Rey-brain needs to _can it._ She’s going to make an utter fool out of herself. Yeah, the Man is hot. He also looks about a decade her senior and he’s a _CFO._ She’s a college sophomore. There is a giant disconnect there. And there’s no way this hardworking hunk of a man would ever respond back to her incredibly awkward advances. She hasn't gone on a date since prom. For a reason. Clearly.

Except. Oh. He’s giving her a soft smirk and he’s _talking._ “Yeah, maybe that’s it.”

He’s not just talking. He’s getting up and walking towards her and then he’s repeating himself again. He’s right in her face. _His_ face, which she can now she more clearly than ever, is rather . . . interesting. His eyes are sunken in and shallow but there’s still a hint of a smile in them, and his nose is large and his lips look incredibly soft and freckles form a constellation across his face. He’s not handsome in the tall dark traditional sense, she takes back her words. His face is a little too sallow and pale and his features are a little bit too unfitting for that. But he’s still absolutely striking and he’s very close to her face. Very close. In fact, she thinks she can smell his breath. Or maybe that’s just the scent of the coffeeshop. Whatever. It’s warm.

“You know what? I think that’s definitely it.”

She’s dead. A goner. She’s never going to recover from this. She’s going to split all her few worldly possessions between Finn and Rose. Rose’ll be happy. She loves Rey’s boots. They were a good thrift find.

Figuring that she has nothing to lose, she exhales and hopes her breath doesn’t smell too terrible. “I’m Rey.”

With a wry smile, he backs away a little and holds out a hand. “I’m Ben. Nice to meet you, Rey.”

She scoffs and takes it. “You technically met me, like, three weeks ago.”

Neither of them let go of each other’s hands. It should be awkward but it doesn’t really feel that way. It actually feels pretty much fine. Kind of comfortable. He has a nice hand and his fingers are really big. And they’re smooth, in juxtaposition to hers. She blurts it out. “And you have nice hands. And big fingers.”

Yup, that’s blood straight-up rushing to her face. _You have big fingers? What the fuck, Rey-brain? That was basically an invitation for him to —_

“Thanks, I guess. I’m glad you like them,” and he’s blushing too. And they’re just standing there. The two of them. Blushing.

“So, you work here?”

“I go to SFSU, actually. I’m a mechanical engineering major. I just work here part-time. The owner’s really nice.”

“Yeah — Maz is an old friend of my parents. She’s always been a sweet lady.”

Wait. “You know Maz?”

He lets go of her hand (of course it’s a little awkward, it can’t not be awkward) and shoves his into his pockets. “Yeah, that’s why I started to come out here instead of staying next to my workplace,” something about that statement doesn’t seem to sit quite right on his tongue. “I love the ambiance,” his eyes trace the wood-plated shop, and she follows them to watch him soften and look at the jukebox in the corner and the license plates across the left wall. “I came here a lot as a kid. It’s a great place.”

“It is. Maz has been really helpful to me.”

“She’s always been someone I’ve been able to put my faith into. I haven’t had the time to come around during the daytime,” he frowns. “I’d like to talk to her. It’s been a while.”

“She usually comes in during the afternoon, but she lets us kids run it most of the time. It’s harder for her to get around.”

“I can’t imagine Maz not coming around here as much. She used to let me run around near the machines, but she’d whack me if I touched anything.”

“Yeah, that sounds like Maz.”

After a moment she points towards his computer again. The screen’s grown dark in his absence. Brave the odds. “Why do you come in here at night, all the time? It can’t be healthy.”

“Talk about it. My sleep schedule is a mess. You probably get it though, you’re in college.”

“Yup,” she raised an eyebrow, “but I do sleep before I work here. At least five hours a day. I have a rule.”

“That’s impressive.”

“Thank you, sir,” she bows over the counter, and they both erupt into laughter for a second. “But seriously, you’ve been coming in every day for the past few weeks —”

“Not every day,” he casually interrupts. 

“Well, you come in every day I’ve been working —”

“Yes. Every day you’ve been working.”

She knits her brows together again. “What?”

“Oh, shit,” his face has turned even paler (if possible). “What did I just say?”

“That you’ve only been coming in when I’ve been working.”

“Um. Well. I guess you do act drunk when you’re tired.”

If he’s saying what she thinks he’s saying that’s _mildly_ creepy behavior and he might be hot but a lot of stalkers are hot and that’s weird and unattractive. “Have you been stalking me?”

“What? No! No, oh my. No, I have not been stalking you,” he shoves his face into his hands again, the countertop being the only thing separating them. His former suave self seems to have been replaced by a bit of a nervous mess. _Relatable._

“That’s sort of what it sounds like.”

“No! I —” he moves his hands up to his hair “ — I hadn’t seen Maz in a few years, and I wanted to talk to her, and I had the genius idea to come in in the middle of the night, and then I saw you, and you’re gorgeous, and I wanted to ask you out but I couldn’t get it up and I saw the schedule on the bulletin and — I do sound like I’ve been stalking you,” he finished unhappily, staring at his shoes. “I’m so sorry, I’m normally so much more composed than this —”

She stands for a minute, taking in his frazzled frame, and bursts into laughter. _Actual_ laughter, not _haha-you’re-funny-professor-please-give-me-extra-credit-because-I-hate-history_ laughter. She bends over, her eyes watering. “You wanted to ask me out?”

“Well — yes,” he looks sort of bedraggled. His story’s kind of strange but he looks awfully endearing, so she just gives him a bright smile. 

“Why didn’t you just ask?”

“Wait, what?”

Poor man. He looks more confused than she does when trying to do taxes. So she reaches out a hand to him, one he slowly takes. Then she looks into his eyes and smiles. “Hey, I’m Rey. Would you want to get coffee sometime?”

Yeah, he’s sleep-deprived as fuck. She can literally see his mind connect the dots while he gazes at her. “Really?’

The corner of her mouth quirks. “Don’t make me redraw my offer, Ben.”

She won’t. It’s the Man. This is really a best-case scenario. Luck’s on her side. Maybe she’ll land an interview next weekend.

He gives her a bright, toothy smile too — which looks rather innocent, in a strange way, because this guy is definitely not innocent — and ties their hands together closer. “I’d like that, Rey. Can I have your number?”

She takes out her phone from her back pocket and he keys himself in. She smiles when she sees that he’s put a winky face next to his name before sliding it back into her jeans. Then she leans forwards against the counter. He doesn’t move, just looks at her, seeming slightly entranced.

Her instincts have been serving her pretty well for the past hour so she winks at him and boops his nose with her finger. He draws back and she bursts into laughter again at the look on his face. “You should really go home and get into bed, Ben. Maybe call an Uber. I don’t think you should be driving. Your car will be safe here.”

He nods at her and slowly walks back to where his laptop bag is set, opening his computer to close it again and slide it in. His suit jacket’s on the outside of the chair, and he grabs it. The night outside is chilly. She knows he’ll need it. 

“Are you going to get an Uber?” she calls to him as he slides his bag over his shoulder.

He gives her one last sleepy look with a smirk. “I can walk home from here. Keep my car safe, will you?” 

She nods.

“I’ll text you in the afternoon, Rey.”

Right before the door slams closed she calls his attention back to her. “I better not see you here tomorrow night.”

With one last wink the door slams closed and he disappears into the windy San Franciscan night. She smiles at the door giddily before leaving Rose a text — she’ll see it when she wakes up — and checking the time. Then she stares at her open bag on the floor, physics homework peeking out, and breaks out into laughter all by herself. 

  
  
  


**Author's Note:**

> ngl, wrote this in stress. certain things happening in america are also happening on my front lawn. strange times we live in. even if you don't have a curfew please stay safe :)
> 
> thank you for reading my lil stress fluff and i hope everyone is doing okay in the fandom and in general! lots of love <3
> 
> also this is totally inspired by the fact that i'm doing my driver's ed course and just sat through an hour of being lectured by my parents on how driving tired is as bad as driving drunk


End file.
